AI isn't that Smart

"All that is unique and holy about our human nature can bring perspective to our AI-hyped world."

Here's an article I wrote for the Calgary Herald...

I was comforted by an article I’d recently read that laid out the shortfalls of artificial intelligence (AI). In it, the authors push back on the claim that AI has now met the level of general human intelligence—what AI proponents call Artificial General Intelligence (AGI).

The article argues that the limited range of AI intelligence cannot compare to the breadth of human intelligence. Where AI is smart within a narrow band of knowledge, human intelligence is comprehensive across a wide array of complex and ever-changing environments. Human knowledge is more sophisticated when it comes to values, adaptability, learning via varying means, abstraction, judgment, and morality.

What really struck me in the article was a comment on how some leaders in the field of AI (in an attempt to better commercialize the product) had altered the definition of Artificial General Intelligence. Because they could not meet a human intelligence-based bar, they lowered it by focusing solely on certain kinds of performance-based metrics and outcomes.

But, of course, there is far more to intelligence than the mere mastery of equations, movement, or production.

While it’s a bit unsettling to read that AI is being oversold, it’s also reassuring.

AI is not as smart as we think.

When I think about the complex nature of human beings, I doubt if AI will ever be able to fully replicate the brilliance and scope of our intelligence.

Consider the multi-sensory way we engage the world. Through the simple act of making a meal we express and receive knowledge via sight, touch, hearing, smell, and taste—often all at the same time. And many rely on gut feelings for major life decisions. When we tell someone how much we love them, we communicate via eye-contact, nearness, and a certain tone of voice. And think about all the ways you speak to others without words—via laughter, a sigh, or through silence.

Human beings have a highly developed means of receiving and expressing truth.

And researchers, even now, don’t fully understand the depths of biological wisdom that has been woven into our senses. Every time a scientist discovers something new—about the nature of hearing, seeing, or touch—they realize there’s still more to be discovered.

For a person of faith, this makes sense. If our capacities to know are created by God, how can we fully understand how they work? The same applies to the very nature of our brains, consciousness, and emotions. How can AI ever catch up?

And what about the part of human wisdom that comes directly from God?

Many faith traditions believe in a God who draws near to human beings and shares wisdom with them. Just one word from God can hold a lifetime’s worth of truth. While I’m pretty sure that God appreciates our technological advances with AI, I’m not so sure that God would ever whisper a word of wisdom to an algorithm.

This makes those of us with a soul unique.

Were AI able to gather up all human intelligence, over all of time, it would still fall short of the potential of human brains and bodies and communities of human beings collectively growing in wisdom, knowledge, and understanding.

All that is unique and holy about our human natures can bring perspective to our AI-hyped world. We don’t need to be intimidated by the so-called intelligence of these new technologies. We’re smarter than they are, and our intelligence has been designed by the Maker of the Cosmos.

Knowing that an infinitely wise God is providently holding our world as we step into an AI-shaped future is deeply assuring.